The Summerland (8 page)

There was something there, just hitting at the back of his consciousness, something his tired brain just could not or would not pinpoint. Turning to Agent Drebin and reaching for his second cup of coffee of the day he asked, “So, where do we go from here?”

Drebin looked up, the strain of the past day showing on his expressive features. He’d been through dozens of these crime scenes and investigations, and they always hit him like a punch in the gut. Criminal profiling probably was not the best career choice for a man as attuned to human suffering as he, but it was one of the most rewarding things in his life, and the puzzle of actually putting together a human psyche was just too compelling to ignore. He knew what Ashton was asking, and knew that he wasn’t going to like the answer. Waiting was seldom the favorite pastime of cops, yet they seemed to do so much of it.

He snaked a long arm down the table, pouring a cup of coffee before answering. “Our top priority is going to be IDing those bodies. I need to know as much about the victims as possible to construct a profile. I know we’ve already established that he’s a single white male, 30-45 years old. But given the new crime scene elements, namely the candle wax and the cause of death, I have to revise my original opinion. If each of these women was strangled, then shot, then we’re beyond the scope of the ‘normal’ serial killer.”

He saw, actually
saw
, the light go on above the sheriff’s head. “What.” It was not a question, but a demand.

“
Shit. Things moved so fast this morning that I didn’t even catch it. One of our local oldsters came in here this morning threatening to go to the press about the candle wax. His grandson is one of our deputies, and a total ass to boot, so I expect that information to be common knowledge by nightfall, but I’ll deal with that later.” He stated, waving a hand as if to swat away an errant fly.

“
Anyway, when he was here, he was ranting and raving about the Wiccan coven that meets up the river. He was babbling about how these women had been sacrificed to the devil by this coven. It just clicked. The wax and its location are almost a perfect match for a Wiccan ceremonial circle and pentagram.” He ran an agitated hand through his hair, glancing up at the agent. “Don’t look at me like that, Drebin, I took Alternative Religions as an elective, OK? “

Drebin sat back in his chair and watched as an impressive display of recollections flitted across the big cowboy’s face. “The dates, oh crap, the dates match almost exactly too. And the lavender, it means something, but I don’t remember what. OK, I’ll get Doug to bring Josie back here to the command post, quietly, so we can question her. When the locals or press get wind of this the shit will hit the fan. Umm, I’ll also need to get some info from San Jose State messengered in on the religion as a whole. Damn it, that’s it.” He glanced at Drebin, the wheels inside his head turning at something approaching the speed of sound. “What?”

Special Agent Frank Drebin leaned forward in his chair and smiled, dangerously. “Sheriff, I cannot wait to see you interrogate a suspect. It’s going to be one of the finest days of my life.”

* * * *

Arden sat resolutely in the hard plastic chair of the public library, scanning the local weekly paper,
The Dispatch
. All fourteen pages of it. Damn, she thought, this is a small town. The incidents the paper carried mostly concerned cows getting loose and kids playing pranks. As she reviewed older issues, she noted that the absence of action covered in last week’s paper was hardly an anomaly. This was the type of town where the only war waged was between Seats Five and Six on the County Supervisor’s Board. What in the hell was her sister doing in a hokey little place like this? And, now that she had some time to think about it, what was so damned important about the sports bag they’d found in her car? And why did they need to keep her car through Friday? It didn’t make any sense.

She mentally started a file in her head…all of the questions she would ask the good sheriff when she saw him next. Which, if she had her way, would be in the next hour. Cupping her hands around the small of her back she stretched then resumed her research.

Chapter Eight

Josie Galloway did not like cops. Never had and never would. It was rather ironic, given her past career choices. Nevertheless, here she sat, strapped into the front seat of a vintage GTO, wondering what in the hell Sergeant Doug Brewster wanted. She studied him furtively, glancing at him out of the side of her eyes. He looked uncomfortable with something, but she didn’t think it was with her, they’d known each other for far too long. They drove into town silently, taking the back route to the Sheriff’s Department, then curving, to her surprise, back up the hill behind the high school. She looked up at him questioningly, then hardened her expression as he shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the door of the library.

Squaring her shoulders as if against some unseen attacker, she entered and found Sheriff Bill Ashton holding a cup of coffee and leaning back in a wooden chair with his booted feet up on a long oak conference table. He just looked at her for a moment, then smiled a lazy smile and motioned for her to be seated. She glanced over her shoulder for a look at the taciturn deputy, but he had disappeared as silently as he’d appeared that morning. Nodding her head hard enough to set the long, colorful spangles at her ears swinging, she sat down in the indicated chair.

Josie Galloway was a gypsy. There was no other way to describe her. She was all dark hair and flashing eyes, with pouty red lips and a lush figure. She ran a curiosity shop frequented by tourists and the occasional Yosemite employee. She was also the High Priestess of the Wiccan coven. They had dealt with each other before, Bill and Josie. And while she always felt she’d been treated fairly, Josie never stopped waiting for the other shoe to drop. It looked like today was that day.

Bill studied her for a moment. She just looked back at him with that stare that seemed to say ‘I know exactly what you’re thinking.’ And she probably did, he thought with a wry, inward smile. To be honest, when he’d returned to Mariposa he’d thought that the little coven was nothing more than a tax dodge of some sort. That was until he met Josie for the first time. After all, he’d studied the Wiccans in college and knew their background. A bunch of druid tree-huggers dabbling in white magick.

The house the coven chose to meet in was a rambling but ramshackle colonial affair that someone within the group had purchased for a song. It was situated across the broad expanse of the Merced River and could only be reached by the narrow footbridge that swung precariously over the churning waters. There were no neighbors, and the main artery to Yosemite, Highway 140, whizzed past on the opposite bank. In past lives it had been a private home, a colony for artists, and more recently, a worship place of the B’nai B’rith faith.

Growing up in Mariposa, Bill thought he’d seen it all when it came to that house, but he’d been wrong. He’d just returned to his hometown and was assigned as a deputy to routine patrol duty. The call had been for disturbing the peace. When he realized what address he was being dispatched to, he knew it was trouble. When he reached the remote site he saw that the disturbing the peace call had not been about the witches, as he’d first assumed. Instead, it concerned approximately 50 protesters parading up and down the highway, congesting traffic and generally being nuisances. And leading them all was none other than Wiley Goltree.

He remembered how Josie had come across that bridge like thunder down the mountain once she’d seen she had backup. He smiled as he remembered the horror on Goltree’s face when she’d threatened to turn him into a tree frog if he didn’t leave them alone. Apparently her threat and the armed deputy at her side had dissuaded the protesters enough to disperse, but the talk that began that day had only enhanced the Wiccan’s inherent weirdness in a town primarily inhabited by ranchers and retailers.

Yet somehow, Josie had ingrained herself into the community, building almost a network of sorts. He had no idea how she’d established herself with the respectable, God-fearing businessmen and women of the community, but establish herself she had.

Shifting his mind from the past to the present, he focused on Josie again. He knew enough about her and her coven to know, deep in his bones, that they had nothing to do with the events of the last three days. Nevertheless, he still had to consider her a suspect, and had no problem pumping her for any and all information he possibly could. Dropping his feet to the tired linoleum, he leaned his tanned, muscular forearms on the table and spoke forthrightly.

“
You’ve heard what we found, haven’t you?” At her nod he continued. “Shit, you probably knew before we did, with the contacts you have. Exactly what have you heard?”

“
Blessed be and merry meet, Bill Ashton.” Josie began in traditional Wiccan fashion, then addressed the matter at hand with humor.

“Sheriff, all I’ve heard since nine a.m. this morning is that I’m going to Hell. Apparently my wild-eyed witches and I burned ten young women at the stake, performing lesbian rituals all the while. At least according to the folks over at the Sugar Pine that is. Of course, I question the sanity of anyone who can consume that much grease and live to eat another day.” She could tell her frivolity wasn’t getting her anywhere with the Sheriff and sighed.

“
All right. I hear you’ve got five dead girls, candle wax and green silk fibers.” She heard a muffled curse in an adjacent room and swung her head toward it. “FBI?” At Bill’s nod she continued. “Agent, you can stay back there if you want, but it’ll be easier on all of us if you come out.”

Drebin walked slowly into the room, shaking his massive head. “Well ma’am, if I had any doubt before, I certainly don’t now. You really are a witch.” He pursed his lips in a wry smile. “If I may?” He indicated to a chair across the table from her and kitty-corner to the Sheriff.

Josie regally nodded hear head, then continued after he’d taken his seat. “I know there is no way I can attest to my whereabouts for any of these murders. I don’t think anyone can, unless they’ve been out of the county for the last five years. What I can tell you is that neither I nor anyone in my coven had anything to do with this. We practice white magick only, and conform strictly to the Wiccan rede:
An it harm none, do what you will.
Are you familiar with that, Agent? Boiled down, it means that you can do anything you want, as long as no one else is harmed by it.” She smiled prettily, knowing that each of the men was dismissing her as a crackpot in their minds.

“
A pretty solid way to look at life, isn’t it? As a religion, at least we’ve got that going for us. We also believe that whatever you do comes back to you threefold. That means both good and bad actions. In my coven, we practice only white magick, because when you practice the bad kind and it comes back at you, look out. From what I’ve heard so far through the rumor mill, it does look like there’s someone out there that’s gone his or her own way.”

Josie placed her arms on the table, leaning forward to look at each of the men. “I’m assuming you think this guy’s doing more than just dabbling, otherwise I wouldn’t be here. I’m also assuming you think it is a man, or I’d be under suspicion and not sitting in this room. If this guy is for real, I have one very important question to ask, and you need to be up front about it. I promise not to tell anyone, and I mean anyone. Can we agree to that?” Each man warily nodded. “How was the pentagram aligned with the victim’s head? Was the point framing their head or their feet?”

She watched as the two men exchanged a long glance, then Drebin gave an almost imperceptible nod. Bill nodded back, shifting back in his chair to get more comfortable. If Drebin was okay with this, then he was going to go with his gut and bring Josie in on this, at least a little bit. “From what we can tell, the wax itself was in a circular shape, with larger red and gold candles placed at each point of the pentagram. The tip framed each victim’s head.”

“
OK,” Josie bobbed her head in time with an unheard beat, thinking. “This guy is practicing white magick then. How were the bodies positioned?”

Again, the two men exchanged a quick glance, brief but loaded with meaning. This time it was Drebin who answered. “They were aligned north to south. Why? Does that have some significance?”

“
Oh yes.” Josie nodded vigorously, looking a little puzzled. “Funny, though, given the time of year I thought he might use a south-north configuration.”

Bill already knew the answer, but asked the question anyway. “Why?”

“
Because it’s Litha, Midsummer to a layman. The sun is in the southern quadrant, the moon in the north. Any ceremonial circle at this time of year is positioned south-north. It’s just the way it’s done. The candle color is consistent with a Litha ritual as well. I’m going to need to do some research on this. When will my background check be complete enough for full disclosure?” The expression on Drebin’s face was priceless.

“
What?” she laughed, amusement ripe in her eyes. “Do you think I’ve always sold overpriced crystals to tourists and stoners? Hardly. I was a paralegal in Vegas for ten years. I know how this works, and I’ve seen the other side of it a hundred times. That doesn’t mean I ever grew to like it. So check away Agent, you’ll find my credentials impeccable. Then maybe I can help you out here.”

Chapter Nine

Arden knew that the Sheriff’s Department, or any police agency for that matter, wasn’t supposed to divulge information to family members or the press, but this was getting ridiculous. She’d been cooling her heels in the waiting room for the last two hours, with nothing to show but a brief glimpse of the Sheriff as he’d walked next to an enormous black guy. After looking at the racial composition of this county, she seriously doubted he was on the Sheriff’s Department. Equal Opportunity did not even seem to be an issue here. Thinking about it, she guessed you had to
have
a black community in order to implement such a program.